Is the march toward higher interest rates underway?

When will the march toward higher interest rates begin? It’s already underway in earnest depending what you’re looking at.

Royal Bank of Canada and TD, two of the country’s biggest home-loan lenders, have both nudged their mortgage rates higher in recent weeks.

And with the economy performing better than what experts expected in recent months, the record-low rates established in the wake of the credit crisis and global recession appear to be headed for an incline for the foreseeable future.

Doug Porter, chief economist at BMO said Wednesday he expects the Bank of Canada to raise its key rate by half a percentage point to 1.5 per cent next year. The BoC sets the benchmark interest rate commercial lenders base their own on.

The Bank of Canada’s overnight interest rate also influences the Canadian dollar and mortgage rates. Any move upward would make the currency more expensive as well as…